


Little Tastes Of Home

by DictionaryWrites



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Cultural Differences, Gen, Homesickness, Identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-15
Updated: 2019-04-15
Packaged: 2020-01-14 13:28:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18477181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DictionaryWrites/pseuds/DictionaryWrites
Summary: Vetinari muses on what it is to be Patrician, the past behind him.





	Little Tastes Of Home

**Author's Note:**

> Havelock Vetinari? Disc!Sicilian? Oh, yeah, baby.

It was a sunny day in Ankh-Morpork. The hot July sun was all but baking the crust on the top of the river Ankh, leaving it even more reluctant than usual to attend to its sludging meander out toward the coast, and the air outside was humid. It reminded him, inescapably, of home visits when he was a child, to Brindisi, with his father, to the Vetinari home on Tiberia, one of the biggest of the Brindisian islands. He and Madam had visited, once or twice, of course, but mostly they’d visited Limbardi, the capital, and it just wasn’t the same, much as he knew Madam preferred it.

It had been years since he last visited Brindisi at all.

Over twenty, he thought, now.

He was Patrician of Ankh-Morpork, now: he had made his choice, for his alignment. No matter the Brindisian blood that flowed in his veins, he was just as much Morporkian, if not more so, and yet–

There were Brindisian eateries in Ankh-Morpork, certainly. Brindisian haberdashers, and musicians, and artists; there were Brindisian dances who knew all the traditional songs, and singers; there were hundreds of Brindisian sailors in the ports, and there were Brindisian business-owners. Some of them had just landed in Ankh-Morpork; some were like Vetinari, the children or grandchildren of Brindisians who had made their business and their home here; others still were descendants of Brindisians, and had only ever known  _Brindisian_ life in its transliterated state, only ever known it with the Morporkian spin upon its details.

Because it wasn’t the same.

Ankh-Morpork shifted things, changed things. They became altered, and they lessened in their severity, became diluted: in other ways, in other aspects, they became stronger, deeper. 

The dish that Vimes so freely called  _pizza_ , here in Ankh-Morpork, would be a good example of the former, in the sense of tradition; it would be the former, in the sense of the unfortunate effect on the gut. 

Vetinari was not a man of mixed alignments. His loyalty was to Ankh-Morpork and her citizens, no matter how unbearable they often were. 

And yet, sometimes, just sometimes, in these little, homesick moments, looking out of the window over the city, he wished that he was looking over Tiberian hills, instead, over dryer, hardy grasses that were so different to the wet ones that grew here, on the Sto Plains; he wished for the olive groves and the vineyards, wished for that hard ground beneath his feet. In Ankh-Morpork, everything was so  _brown,_ stained with all the dyes the rainbow might provide; out over the Sto Plains, everything was such a dark and dismal green, the green of cabbages. But on Tiberia, the colours  _there_ –

He could never go back there, the way that he once did, as a boy. He was a politician, now, the  _Patrician_ : it would not do for him to be seen as Brindisian, rather than Morporkian, and even worse would be to explain to one of the average Morporkians that, actually, he was more  _Tiberian_  than  _Brindisian_ , if it’s all the same to you–

And yet. And yet. 

The world was ever in motion: he had made his sacrifices. He knew that. In the service of Ankh-Morpork, this was to be expected, this could be allowed for. He knew that. It was the  _logical_  thing, the  _proper_  thing. 

At a crisp, quiet knock on the door, he turned his head. Mr Drumknott had been abroad in the city for his lunch, meeting someone on his rare off-hours, and he hadn’t expected the clerk to return so soon. “Yes?”

Mr Drumknott came through the door with all the silent grace of a breezeless day, and Vetinari watched him delicately set a box upon the table beside the window. Vetinari inhaled, taking in the scent of cheese and tomato, of aubergine… 

“Mr Drumknott, do you prognosticate upon my every idle desire?” Vetinari asked, arching an eyebrow.

Mr Drumknott’s delicate expression shifted, and his head turned just slightly to the side. In his eyes, Vetinari saw only polite confusion, and yet, at times, he did wonder… 

“My lord?” Drumknott asked. “Merely that we passed the traditional Brindisian eatery near to the Temple District - their board mentioned scaccia ragusana, and you’ve mentioned before your fondness for the bread. I did watch them prepare it, sir, and I made no mention of your–”

“Mr Drumknott,” Vetinari interrupted. Mr Drumknott’s mouth stilled. “ _Thank_  you.”

“It’s still hot,” Drumknott said, with a small nod of his head, and Vetinari watched him tidy a pile of papers on Vetinari’s desk before flitting from the room again, closing the door shut behind him. Vetinari’s fingers went to the little box, feeling the warmth of it through the cardboard and the foil. 

He  _had_  mentioned it before, there was no doubt. Perhaps, like Vetinari himself, the cooks at the Brindisian eatery were inspired by the clement weather, to put something Tiberian on their specials board, just as he was inspired to think of home. Perhaps, as Vetinari so often suspected, Mr Drumknott’s ability to follow his train of thought went somewhat beyond their political measures, and indeed, beyond Vetinari’s thoughts upon philosophy, or the crossword. 

It hardly mattered, of course.

He might not be able to return truly to  _that_  home, and yet there were little tastes of it to be found within the walls of Ankh-Morpork. 

Vetinari smiled, and he moved to untie the strings upon the box. 

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up [on Dreamwidth](https://dictionarywrites.dreamwidth.org/2287.html). You can send requests [on Tumblr](http://patricianandclerk.tumblr.com/ask), too. Requests always open.


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